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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27830887">morning in this broken world</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/lonelyghosts/pseuds/lonelyghosts'>lonelyghosts</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>you, yourself, your own [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, Gender Non Conformity, Gender Norms, Trans Edelgard von Hresvelg, Trans Hubert von Vestra, dark flier hubert RIGHTS, me banging on intsyncs door: End gendered classes Now.</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 19:41:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,050</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27830887</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/lonelyghosts/pseuds/lonelyghosts</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>There are no classes meant for a mage boy who wants to fly.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Edelgard von Hresvelg &amp; Hubert von Vestra</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>you, yourself, your own [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2015026</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>30</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>morning in this broken world</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>the duality of gendered classes: gives me a ton of room to explore how fucked up it is but also i hate them because i want to make hubert a dark flier</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Some days, Hubert regrets himself. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He is not a man who is in the habit of regretting things. Lady Edelgard's path is going to be a bloody one, and he is prepared to shed blood for her so that she must not; her hands can only be righteous ones. He is one whose hands are unclean, the one who spills blood so that her path is unmarred. He is a shadow, in all ways, and shadows have no time for regrets.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Hubert does not regret his murders, nor the things he has done for his lady. Of all things he regrets, sometimes it is the very fact of his being- the truth of his own self. The things he's given up, in order to become a man.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It is a foolish thing for him to regret, as well, given how much he's fought for it. His father never would have allowed him to be a man, in the way he wanted and yearned for most. Most of the concessions he was given had to be disguised as measures for necessity- his penchant for wearing trousers, his relatively short hair, his distaste for makeup and jewelry. These could only be explained in the way of practicality- convenience. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He made excuses- no assassin could wear petticoats and function at their best for the Emperor- how would they possibly even begin to maneuver, with so many skirts that they made noise with every movement? Long hair was a tactical weakness, one that could be used to tug and pull him towards an opponent if caught in an unfriendly grasp. And makeup and jewelry could make him more identifiable if seen in the shadows. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was all purely strategical, he argued, and his father huffed and puffed and finally relented. Hubert sat in his room after each successful argument and did not allow himself to shake with relief. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>There were other things he did, to be more at ease in his own skin- there are types of magic that Faith can't teach you, things that Faith can't even begin to accomplish. It was not difficult. He has long since worked in the business of transmutations. He learned these things for Lady Edelgard, and yet he cannot deny that he has also worked to reverse engineer them- to turn testosterone to estrogen and estrogen to testosterone both, a transcendental type of alchemical magic. In this way she serves him again, gives him more than he deserves.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lady Edelgard has always given him what protection she could- demanded that his clothes be fitted in the manner of a man's, calling him Hubert instead of Helena and introducing him as 'H. von Vestra' when they were confined to the presence of the nobility. She has a somewhat troubling habit of challenging all those who questioned his gender to duels, challenges that he often had to talk her down from before going and digging up blackmail on the person responsible. She sits by his side in the library and whispers, still barely tall enough to reach his shoulder, that it's not </span>
  <em>
    <span>fair </span>
  </em>
  <span>that she's been allowed to transition but he can't, all because of his father's bigotry. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hubert looks at this girl, who will likely never grow from five foot two because of months of malnutrition and mistreatment, covered in scars, hair white from the sheer trauma she's endured, telling him that the way </span>
  <em>
    <span>he's </span>
  </em>
  <span>been treated is unfair, and thinks he would follow her into the mouth of Hell itself if only she asked. Even if she didn't- he will always be there to light her path.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He cannot deny how lucky he is; there are many others, he knows, who have no one in their corner, who are forced to wear the wrong clothes and answer to broken names. Faerghus is far less accepting, for one. From the brief diplomatic meetings he's attended, he's seen the Fraldarius boy who was once permitted so many freedoms before the death of his brother, before he became the last scion of the family and their only hope of a continued legacy. Before he was no longer permitted to be a rebellious child. Hubert knows he is lucky.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But still- there are things he has had to lose, for this. Things he cannot have. Edelgard makes it clear, at Garreg Mach, that Hubert is a man, and that is something he is very grateful for, but-</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Some nights, he will go down to the stables and look at the animals within. He walks past the many horses, the ones with their own masters already and those who are waiting for their assigned students to attain certifications. He passes the wyverns with their rough, scaly hides, and then he stops to stare at the pegasi.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They're such beautiful creatures, pegasi. Tall and strong and graceful, full of sinuous power. And so kind, always, to their riders. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It has been years since he rode one, but he can still remember the feeling of soaring so far above the world- his knees tucked in front of the wings, his hands in that soft mane, the weightlessness in his stomach as he flew. When he flew so high that it didn't matter that his hair was long and uncut and it didn't matter that he had been forced into a skirt. It all fell away in that glorious moment where he was lighter than air.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He cannot ride the pegasi. He knows this. They only offer that certification to girls, and he knows that the thought of wearing the uniform that they present to Dark Fliers would leave him sick to his stomach with dysphoria. But the wyverns shy away from him, from his ozone scented hands, and there are no classes meant for a mage boy who wants to fly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That does not stop Hubert from coming down to the stables late at night and touching the soft feathers on those lovely wings, pressing his face into their short fur and long manes. He brushes them clean, offers them treats. He stares into their lovely, understanding eyes, and allows himself a foolish, sentimental dream.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>One day, after all the world has been remade with blood and steel and Lady Edelgard's justice, he will saddle a pegasus again, and return to the sky.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
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